Working the door....

In Wal-Mart!

Ok, I looked about and this seemed the best place for the story. First some inside info.

Most people who work at Walmart are underpaid, ok you knew that. However we do get "bonus" checks based on the profit of the store. One thing that affects those checks is shoplifting. What goes out the door comes out of our bonus, so it makes people who work there frown on it.

Now we do have "loss prevention" people. I will not say how many, but it is VERY small. Many times they are NOT in the store at all. We are all given a "class" in handling shoplifting and shoplifters. This takes about an hour..nuff said.

Well, in this class we were shown a video of a worker confronting a woman who was clearly stealing video games. This women goes insane and begins assaulting the worker, kicking, scratching, biting, I mean just crazy. Of course this would have been a good time to keep my mouth shut, no such luck. When we were told "this is why you should not confront them directly," I replied "If anyone in this store EVER assaults me like that they are going to get slammed and choked out."

This did not sit well. After a lengthy lecture about the law, and policy, etc, I guess the best thing to do was nod my head. Nope, not me.

"I will repeat, so we are clear, if ANYONE assaults me, my fault, their fault, nobodies fault, everyones fault, they WILL be slammed to the floor and choked out. If that is a problem, then I suggest you never put me in the position to be assaulted."

Now, they hired me, and it was fine, until they began putting me on the door a few hours every night (I work 10 pm to 7 am) to relieve people. That is another story, cause I have enough material for years of comedy routines.

People come in late at night and WILL try and steal stuff. They think no one is watching and they know we are not supposed to touch them. All we can do is grab the cart, or the item, but if they pull it away and run we let them go.

I had a guy try and walk out with a 52" $1600 TV by claiming his wife was outside with the receipt. I have had them give me receipts that were a day old, or even hours old, and try to get another of the same item. They will then return one for the money, and they get one for free.

Well, a few nights a go we had someone fill up a shopping cart and charge the door. I grabbed the cart; he struck my arm.....

..he was hit with a foot sweep and bounced off the floor!

The only thing saving my rear end is I am claiming that I was wrestling for the cart and they tripped. Lets not enlighten them ok? I was wise enough to let him run away and not clamp the choke on. But I did get a lecture from management that using Judo on a shoplifter would get me fired.

But if you let them leave, EVERY worker at the store hates your guts cause you let their bonus money get away....

But, there is the story.

"Out of every hundred men, ten shouldn't even be there, eighty are just targets, nine are the real fighters, and we are lucky to have them, for they make the battle. Ah, but the one, one is a warrior, and he will bring the others back." -- Hericletus, circa 500 BC

Tell me, what authority do Walmart have to prevent you defending yourself? Legally, are they obliged to protect their workers, or to allow their workers to take reasonable measures to defend themselves?

I don't mean in this specific case - it sounds like you were in no danger.

But if you were assaulted, could Walmart really ask you not to Kimura the Kriminal?

(Genuine question, by the way - not a rhetorical one.)

Last edited by DAYoung; 2/25/2010 3:47pm at .

Martial Arts and Philosophy: Beating and Nothingnessclick here to order on Amazon

Judo doesn't work on the streets. We're going to need security videos.

From a business standpoint, accepting a few thousand bucks on insured stolen products is probably better than potentially being sued for millions because an employee koshi-guruma'd the **** out of someone and wrecked their spine cord for life.

Still, it sounds like a night job at Walmart could be mega-entertaining and less stressful than bouncing at a nighclub.

I worked as part of a uniform off-duty detail at a WalMart here in the northeast at a store that was reportedly one of the highest loss stores of their chain. Things were getting so bad that they decided to bring in the cops to stand by the door.

Well after getting into more confrontations, chases and fights at WalMart on a weekly basis than we had on the street it was reported that the losses at this store were reduced by half. Our pay was increased so that our hourly wage was higher than the managers.

Then after a change in management (and a lawsuit adverse philosophy) it was decided that we shouldn't be allowed to lock people up unless their loss prevention observed the "selection, concealment and passing of all points of purchase" by the offender, otherwise we were to let everybody walk out.

Well, being the local cops with a reputation for taking no **** it was decided that letting shitheads walk past us with stolen property and a smirk on their faces just wasn't going to happen. After an incident where a manager refused to let us see a security film showing an employee stealing a customers credit card we decided that they could hire Brinks.

The running joke was that WalMart was going to ask us to put a blue "can I help you" vest over our uniforms so we told them to go **** themselves.

Ok, I looked about and this seemed the best place for the story. First some inside info.

Most people who work at Walmart are underpaid, ok you knew that. However we do get "bonus" checks based on the profit of the store. One thing that affects those checks is shoplifting. What goes out the door comes out of our bonus, so it makes people who work there frown on it.

Now we do have "loss prevention" people. I will not say how many, but it is VERY small. Many times they are NOT in the store at all. We are all given a "class" in handling shoplifting and shoplifters. This takes about an hour..nuff said.

Well, in this class we were shown a video of a worker confronting a woman who was clearly stealing video games. This women goes insane and begins assaulting the worker, kicking, scratching, biting, I mean just crazy. Of course this would have been a good time to keep my mouth shut, no such luck. When we were told "this is why you should not confront them directly," I replied "If anyone in this store EVER assaults me like that they are going to get slammed and choked out."

This did not sit well. After a lengthy lecture about the law, and policy, etc, I guess the best thing to do was nod my head. Nope, not me.

"I will repeat, so we are clear, if ANYONE assaults me, my fault, their fault, nobodies fault, everyones fault, they WILL be slammed to the floor and choked out. If that is a problem, then I suggest you never put me in the position to be assaulted."

Now, they hired me, and it was fine, until they began putting me on the door a few hours every night (I work 10 pm to 7 am) to relieve people. That is another story, cause I have enough material for years of comedy routines.

People come in late at night and WILL try and steal stuff. They think no one is watching and they know we are not supposed to touch them. All we can do is grab the cart, or the item, but if they pull it away and run we let them go.

I had a guy try and walk out with a 52" $1600 TV by claiming his wife was outside with the receipt. I have had them give me receipts that were a day old, or even hours old, and try to get another of the same item. They will then return one for the money, and they get one for free.

Well, a few nights a go we had someone fill up a shopping cart and charge the door. I grabbed the cart; he struck my arm.....

..he was hit with a foot sweep and bounced off the floor!

The only thing saving my rear end is I am claiming that I was wrestling for the cart and they tripped. Lets not enlighten them ok? I was wise enough to let him run away and not clamp the choke on. But I did get a lecture from management that using Judo on a shoplifter would get me fired.

But if you let them leave, EVERY worker at the store hates your guts cause you let their bonus money get away....

But, there is the story.

I'm sure their policy does not supersede your right to defend yourself. If they fire you, look into legal remediation. Although, first, check the laws of the land. Here in Washington, it is a "stand your ground" state with regards to self defense. I would, however, seek additional advice on this from those who are, far and beyond, more qualified than I am to provide, but that is my opinion of the matter.

I'm sure their policy does not supersede your right to defend yourself.

it doesn't have to. The right to self-defense is orthogonal to the legal notion of at-will employment. For good or ill—ill in my mind, like yours—the employer made its policy clear, the employee insisted that he would violate the policy even if it were his fault (or nobody's or everyones') even after the policy was repeated to him. They could have fired him on the spot. Hell, they could still fire him for that reason, or for no reason.

The general exceptions to at-will is a) stuff in a contract, collective bargaining agreement, or policies in an employee handbook, b) personal characteristics (age, race, gender, pregnancy, disability, religion, national origin) or c) specific protected actions such as union organizing, testifying against the employer in a wrongful dismissal suit, etc.

"I will repeat, so we are clear, if ANYONE assaults me, my fault, their fault, nobodies fault, everyones fault, they WILL be slammed to the floor and choked out. If that is a problem, then I suggest you never put me in the position to be assaulted," is not a protected action, even in states with "stand your ground" rules.

After all, Wal-Mart isn't telling him not to defend himself. Its telling him not to come to work anymore.

1. They still hired me AFTER me making myself clear. They have no claim not to know my intent or feelings.

2. That said, it is private property and they can enforce all sorts of rules. Example, there are NO pocket knives of any length allowed to be on your person. You use the approved Walmart box cutter, period.

3. That said, NO ONE is going to claw my face, bite me, and kick at my balls without a serious response from me. As long as they keep their hands off of me, I will keep my hands off of them.

But, they hired me, no one else would. So I do try and do my best for them. I draw the line at getting my balls kicked.....

"Out of every hundred men, ten shouldn't even be there, eighty are just targets, nine are the real fighters, and we are lucky to have them, for they make the battle. Ah, but the one, one is a warrior, and he will bring the others back." -- Hericletus, circa 500 BC